Carl Eugene Watts (November
7, 1953 – September 21, 2007), also known by his nickname Coral, was
an American serial killer dubbed "The Sunday Morning Slasher". Watts
is now suspected to have killed more than 100 women, which would make
him the most prolific serial killer in American history.

He obtained immunity for a dozen murders as a result of a plea bargain
with prosecutors in 1982; at one point it appeared that he could be
released in 2006. He died of prostate cancer while serving two
sentences of life without parole in a Michigan prison for the murders
of Helen Dutcher and Gloria Steele.

Early life

Carl Eugene Watts was born in Killeen, Texas to Richard Eugene Watts
and Dorothy Mae Young. His father was a private first class in the
Army, and his mother was a kindergarten art teacher. When Watts was
less than two years of age, his parents separated and he was raised by
his mother. Watts and his mother moved to Inkster, Michigan, and in
1962, Dorothy Mae married a mechanic named Norman Caesar with whom she
had two daughters.

As a child, Watts was described as being strange. Around the age of
twelve, Watts claimed that this was when he started to fantasize about
torturing and killing girls and young women. During adolescence, Watts
began to stalk girls and is believed to have killed his first victim
before the age of 15.

When Watts was 13, he was infected with meningitis which caused him to
be held back in the eighth grade. Upon his return to school, Watts had
difficulty keeping up with other students. At school, he would often
receive failing grades, and was reading at a third grade level by age
16. He also suffered severe bullying at school.

On June 29, 1969, Watts was arrested for sexually assaulting 26-year-old
Joan Gave. When Watts was tried, he was sentenced to the Lafayette
Clinic, a mental hospital in Detroit. According to a psychiatric
assessment, Watts was revealed to suffer from mild mental retardation,
with a full scale I.Q. of 68, and to have a delusional thought process,
though a police officer interrogating Watts after his arrest later
stated that he appeared to be "very, very intelligent" with an "excellent
memory". He was released from the Lafayette Clinic on November 9,
1969.

Despite his poor grades, Watts graduated from high school in 1973, and
received a football scholarship to Lane College in Jackson, Tennessee.
He was expelled from Lane College after only three months because he
was accused of stalking and assaulting women. Another reason he was
expelled was because many people at Lane College believed Watts was a
suspect in the brutal murder of a female student; however, there was
not enough evidence to convict him of the murder. After his expulsion
he moved to Houston, Texas.

Murders

Watts' career as a serial killer began when he was 20 years old in
1974, by kidnapping his victims from their homes, torturing them, and
then murdering them. On October 30, 1974, Watts tortured and brutally
murdered 20-year-old Gloria Steele, who was believed to be his second
victim.

Watts, who was African American, almost always killed young white
women. Watts killed females between the ages of 14 and 44 using
methods such as strangulation, stabbing, bludgeoning, and drowning.
Watts had murdered dozens of women between 1974 and 1982, and despite
the many women he murdered, Watts was not discovered as a serial
killer for almost eight years.

There were several reasons for this. He attacked in several different
jurisdictions and even different states. Even with the advent of DNA
testing it was still nearly impossible because he rarely performed
sexual acts on his victims, unlike most serial killers of women and
girls, and his crimes were not thought to be sexually motivated. Watts
was also not suspected to be involved with any of the murders by the
people who knew him, and was not a police suspect in any of the
murders until his arrest in 1982.

Arrest and discovery

On May 23, 1982, Watts was arrested for breaking into
the home of two young women in Houston, and attempting to kill them.
While in custody, police began to link Watts with the recent murders
of a number of women. Until early 1981, he had lived in Michigan,
where authorities suspected him of being responsible for the murders
of at least 10 women and girls there. Watts was previously questioned
about the murders in 1975, but there had not been enough evidence to
convict him. At that time, Watts had spent a year in prison for
attacking a woman, who survived.

Prosecutors in Texas did not feel they had enough evidence to convict
Watts of murder, so in 1982 they arranged a plea bargain. If Watts
gave full details and confessions to his crimes, they would give him
immunity from the murder charges and he would, instead, face just a
charge of burglary with intent to murder. This charge carried a 60-year
sentence. He agreed with the deal and promptly confessed in detail to
12 murders in Texas. However, Michigan authorities refused to go in on
the deal so the cases in that state remained open.

Watts later claimed that he had killed 40 women, and has also implied
that there were more than 80 victims in total. He would not confess
outright to having committed these murders, however, because he did
not want to be seen as a "mass murderer". Police still consider Watts
a suspect in 90 unsolved murders.

Michigan trial

Watts was sentenced to the agreed 60 years. However,
shortly after he began serving time, the Texas Court of Appeals ruled
that he had not been informed that the bathtub and water he attempted
to drown Lori Lister in was considered a deadly weapon. The ruling
reclassified him as a nonviolent felon, making him eligible for early
release.

At the time, Texas law allowed nonviolent felons to have three days
deducted from their sentences for every one day served as long as they
were well behaved. Watts was a model prisoner, and had enough time
deducted from his sentence that he could have been released as early
as May 9, 2006. The law allowing early release was abolished after
public outcry, but could not be applied retroactively according to the
Texas Constitution.

In 2004, Michigan Attorney General Mike Cox went on national TV asking
for anyone to come forward with information in order to try and
convict Watts of murder to ensure he was not released. Joseph Foy of
Westland, Michigan, came forward to say that he had seen a man fitting
Watts' description murder Helen Dutcher, a 36-year-old woman who died
after being stabbed twelve times in December 1979. Foy identified
Watts by his eyes, which he described as being "evil" and devoid of
emotion.

Although Watts had immunity from prosecution for the 12 killings he
had admitted to in Texas, he had no immunity agreement in Michigan.
Before his 2004 trial, law enforcement officials asked the trial judge
to allow the Texas confessions into evidence, which he agreed to.

Watts was promptly charged with the murder of Helen Dutcher. A
Michigan jury convicted him on November 17, 2004, after hearing
eyewitness testimony from Joseph Foy.

On December 7, he was sentenced to life imprisonment. Two days later,
authorities in Michigan started making moves to try him for the murder
of Western Michigan University student Gloria Steele, who was stabbed
to death in 1974.

Watts' trial for the Steele murder began in Kalamazoo, Michigan on
July 25, 2007; closing arguments concluded July 26. The following day
the jury returned a guilty verdict. Watts was sentenced to life
imprisonment without parole on September 13. He was incarcerated at a
maximum security prison in Ionia, Michigan. He died of prostate cancer
on September 21 in a Jackson, Michigan hospital.

The case is featured in episodes of Cold Case Files and truTV series
The Investigators.

Wikipedia.org

Carl Eugene "Coral" Watts

Childhood Years: Carl
Eugene Watts was born in Fort Hood, Texas on November 7, 1953, to
Richard and Dorothy Watts. His parents divorced in 1955 and Carl began
spending a lot of his time with his grandmother. When his mother
relocated to Detroit, Carl remained with his grandmother for awhile. She
told the Houston Chronicle that even as a young child, Carl enjoyed
hunting and skinning rabbits. During his childhood, he developed
meningitis and suffered high fevers, resulting in learning disabilities.

First Arrest: By the 1960s,
Watts was described as a polite and soft-spoken young man. He had
athletic ability and participated in the Golden Gloves boxing program,
although academically he was considered below average. By the age of 15,
he demonstrated violent behavior. While doing his paper route, he
knocked on the apartment door of a woman and attacked her when she
opened the door. When arrested he told police, "He just felt like
beating someone up."

Institutionalized: In September
1969, prompted by his lawyer, Watts was institutionalized in a hospital
in Detroit. Within three months, he was evaluated and placed on
outpatient treatment by Dr. Gary Ainsworth. In his final review of Watts,
Dr. Ainsworth stated, "This patient is a paranoid young man who is
struggling for control of strong homicidal impulses. His behavior
controls are faulty, and there is a high potential for violent acting
out. This individual is considered dangerous."

High school & College: Watts
continued high school after his release from the hospital. He was
involved in sports but continued to decline academically. He was a drug
user, a loner, and was often disciplined by school officials for his
volatile behavior with female classmates. He graduated at age 19. During
this time, he rarely attended outpatient treatment. He was accepted to
Lane College on a football scholarship, but due to injuries he was
unable to complete his first year, and returned home to Detroit.

Second Psychological Evaluation:
Watts returned to college after being accepted into a special
scholarship and mentoring program sponsored by Western Michigan
University in Kalamazoo. Prior to attending the program,
Watts was again evaluated at the outpatient facility, where it was
determined that he was still a danger and had a "strong impulse to beat
up women," yet due to the right to confidentiality policies, staffers
were unable to alert authorities or the college Watts was attending.

A Cat Circling Its Prey: On
October 25, 1974, Lenore Knizacky answered her door and was attacked by
a man who said he was looking for Charles. She fought back and survived.
On October 30, Gloria Steel, 19, was found dead with 33 stab wounds to
her chest. A witness reported speaking with a man at Steele’s complex,
who said he was looking for Charles. Diane Williams reported being
attacked on November 12, under the same circumstances. She survived and
managed to see the attacker's car and make a report to the police.

First Confession: Watts was
picked out in a line-up by Knizacky and Williams and arrested on assault
and battery charges. He admitted to attacking 15 females, but refused to
talk about the Steele murder. His attorney arranged for Watts to commit
himself into the Kalamazo State Hospital. The hospital psychiatrist
investigated Watts' background and learned that at the previous
institution, Watts was said to have possibly killed two women by choking
them. He diagnosed Watts with an anti-social personality disorder.

Competently Dangerous: Prior to
Watts' trial, he had a court ordered evaluation at the Center for
Forensic Psychiatry in Ann Arbor. The examining doctor described Watts
as dangerous and felt he would most likely attack again and was found
competent to stand trial. Carl, or Coral as he now called himself, pled
'no contest,' and received a one year sentence on the assault and
battery charges but was never charged in the murder of Steel. In June,
1976, he was out of jail and back home in Detroit with his mother.

The Sunday Morning Slasher Emerges:
Ann Arbor is 40 miles west of Detroit and the home of the University of
Michigan. In April 1980, the Ann Arbor police were called to the home of
17-year-old Shirley Small. She had been
attacked and repeatedly cut with an instrument resembling a scalpel. She
bled to death on the sidewalk where she fell. Glenda Richmond, 26, was
the next victim. She was found by her doorway, dead from over 28 stab
wounds. Rebecca Greer, 20, was next. She died outside her door after
being stabbed 54 times.

A task force was formed, led by
Detective Paul Bunten, to investigate the murders that occurred within
five months of each other. The task force was dealing with no evidence
and no witnesses.

Sergeant James Arthurs contacted the task force after
reading about the murders. He told them of his past experience with
Watts and the similarities of Watts' previous crimes to those now under
investigation.

By this time, Watts was working with his stepfather
at a trucking company, had a child, then later met another woman who he
married.

In October, 1979, Watts was arrested for prowling
around in Southfield, Detroit suburb. The charges were later dropped.
Investigators did note, however, that during the previous year, five
women in the same suburb were assaulted on separate occasions, but with
similar circumstances. None were killed, nor could any of them identify
their attacker.

By 1979 and 1980, attacks on women in Detroit and
surrounding areas became more frequent and violent and similar in style.

By May 1980, Watts was divorced. His wife stated that
it was due to his strange behavior, which included his habit of leaving
their home for hours, immediately after they engaged in sex. Within
months, attacks in neighboring Wisteria, Ontario were being reported
that were of the same nature as those in Ann Arbor and Detroit.

The Windsor, Ontario
Connection: In July, 1980, in Windsor, Irene Kondratowiz, 22, was
attacked, but lived after having her throat slashed. Sandra Dalpe, 20,
lived through being stabbed from behind. Mary Angus, 30, of Windsor,
escaped attack by screaming when she realized she was being followed.
She picked Watts out of a photo line-up but was unable to say for sure
the attacker was him. Detectives discovered that Watts' car was recorded
as leaving Windsor for Detroit after each episode. Watts became Bunten’s
leading suspect.

Rebecca Huff's Book is Found:
On November 15, 1980, an Ann Arbor woman contacted police after she
became frightened when she discovered that a man was following her. The
women hid in a doorway and the police observed their suspect as he
frantically searched for her. When they pulled the man over in his car,
he was identified as Coral Watts. Inside the car they found screw
drivers and wood filing tools, but the most important discovery was a
book that had Rebecca Huff’s name on it.

A Move to Houston: In late
January 1981, Watts was brought in on a warrant to give a blood sample.
Bunten took the opportunity to talk to Watts but the interview ended
without any confession and the blood test failed to link him to any
crimes. By that spring, Coral had enough of Bunten and his task force,
and made the move to Columbus, Texas, where he found work at an oil
company. Houston was 70 miles away, and Watts began spending his
weekends cruising the city.

Houston Police Get a Heads Up, but
Murders Continue: Bunten forwarded Watts' file to the Houston police,
who were able to locate Watts, but unable to find any evidence linking
him directly to any of the Houston crimes.

September 5, 1981, Lillian Tilley was
attacked at her Arlington apartment and drowned. Later that same month,
Elizabeth Montgomery, 25, died after being stabbed in the chest while
out walking her dogs. Shortly afterwards, Susan Wolf, 21, was attacked
and murdered, as she got out of her car at her home.

Watts is Finally Caught: On May
23, 1982, he attacked roommates Lori Lister and Melinda Aguilar, tied
them up, and then attempted to drown Lister in their apartment bathtub.
Aguilar was able to escape by jumping head first off of her balcony.
Lister was saved by a neighbor and Watts was caught and arrested. The
body of Michele Maday was found the same day, drowned in her bathtub in
a nearby apartment.

Plea Bargain Time: Under
interrogation, Watts refused to talk. Harris County Assistant District
Attorney Ira Jones made a deal with Watts in order to get him to confess.
Incredibly, he agreed to give him immunity to the charge of murder, if
Watts would agree to confess to his murders. Jones was hoping to bring
closure to the families of some of the 50 unsolved murders of women in
the Houston area. Coral eventually admitted attacking 19 women, 13 of
which he confessed to murdering.

Confession of 80 Killings: By
the time it was over, Watts admitted to 80 additional murders in
Michigan and Canada, but refused to give details because he did not have
an immunity agreement for those murders. Coral pled guilty to one count
of burglary with intent to kill. Judge Shaver decided that the water in
the bathtub could be constituted as a deadly weapon, which would result
in the parole board not being able to count Watts' 'good conduct time,'
when determining his parole eligibility.

Slippery Appeals: On September,
3, 1982, Watts was sentenced to 60 years in prison. In 1987, after a
failed attempt to escape prison by slipping through the bars, Watts
decided to begin appealing his sentence, but his appeal lacked the
support of his attorney. But in October, 1987, unrelated to any of Watts
appeals, the court decided that criminals must be told that a 'deadly
weapon' finding may occur during their indictment and to fail to do so
violates the criminal’s rights.

Watts Gets a Lucky Break: In
1989, the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals, decided that because the
Judge failed to inform Coral that the bathtub water could be deemed a
lethal weapon, that he would not be required to serve his entire
sentence. Watts was now eligible for retroactive 'good time earned'
equaling three days for every one day served. This would mean he would
be released from prison on May 9, 2006.

Lawrence Fossi, whose wife was
murdered by Watts, is fighting the release with every possible legal
maneuver he can find. In the meantime, Michigan, having never agreed to
the plea bargain, decided to try him for the Dec. 1, 1979, stabbing
death of Helen Dutcher.

Houston detectives are also reopening
an old crime of 14-year-old, Emily La Qua, who Watts confessed to
killing but was not given immunity for that specific murder.

As reported by the Dallas Observer,
last summer the families of several of Watts' victims met for a 20th
memorial since his capture and incarceration. During the memorial, some
learned for the first time, of the turn of events in regards to Watts'
possible early release.

Laura Allen, whose daughter Anna Ledet,
was brutally murdered by Watts, has since found solace through God and
suggested that it is time to forgive.

Joe Tilley, whose young daughter Linda
fought so hard to live, but lost her battle against Watts as he held her
under the water of the apartment complex swimming pool, summed up how
most of the other families feel about Watts. Tilley said, "Forgiveness
cannot be bestowed when forgiveness is not sought. This is a
confrontation with pure evil, with principalities and the powers of the
air."

Watts, Coral Eugene

Born at Fort Hood, Texas, during 1953, Watts grew up on the move, attending public schools in Texas, West Virginia, and Michigan before finishing high school -- after a fashion -- in Inkster, a Detroit suburb. Despite a tested IQ of 75, he was admitted to Western Michigan University, at Kalamazoo, and was enrolled there when he started acting out his violent fantasies against women in October 1974.

His first two victims managed to survive when Watts came knocking on the doors of their apartments, starting on October 25. Watts choked them both unconscious, leaving them for dead with no attempt at rape or robbery, but he was disappointed when the press reported both of them were still alive.

He found knives more efficient, claiming his first fatality on October 30, when 19-year-old co-ed Gloria Steele was stabbed 33 times and discarded near campus. Identified as a suspect in the non-fatal assaults, Watts had himself committed to a state hospital on the advice of his attorney, refusing to answer any questions in the Steele murder case.

Fourteen months after the fact, he struck a bargain with Kalamazoo prosecutors, pleading guilty to one assault in return for dismissal of another similar charge, accepting a one-year sentence in the county jail. Upon release, he moved to Ann Arbor, marrying long enough to father a child, but his deep-seated hatred of women made the relationship impossible, and he was divorced in May 1980.

Meanwhile, Watts was hunting. When his marriage started showing signs of strain, he spent some time with relatives in the Detroit suburb of Grosse Pointe Farms, jogging by night to keep himself in shape.

On October 31, 1979, he invaded the home of 35-year-old Jeanne Clyne, slashing her to death -- again without attempting rape or robbery -- before he fled. Eyewitnesses described a black man jogging near the scene, but homicide detectives had no way of linking their case with a five-year-old series of crimes against women in Kalamazoo. Back in Ann Arbor, Watts entered criminal history as the "Sunday Morning Slasher," claiming at least three victims in motiveless, random attacks committed between 3 and 5 a.m. on peaceful sabbath mornings. In April 1980, 18-year-old Shirley Small was hacked to death in her own apartment, followed by 20-year-old Glenda Richmond in July and 29-year-old Rebecca Huff in September.

Canadian authorities believe Watts may have crossed the border into Windsor that October, assaulting 20-year-old Sandra Dalpe outside her apartment, leaving her near death with multiple wounds to the face and throat. By that time, Watts had fallen under scrutiny from local homicide investigators. A task force was organized in July 1980, to probe the Sunday slashings, and Watts was placed under sporadic surveillance, a November court order permitting officers to plant a homing device in his car.

Despite pursuit by squad cars and a helicopter, though, Watts managed to commit at least one murder while police were on his trail. Fired from his job as a diesel mechanic in March 1981, he moved south to Houston, leaving the murder investigation at loose ends.

Michigan authorities alerted their Texas counterparts, but Watts was accustomed to living under surveillance. He found a new mechanics job and started visiting a local church, sometimes living with relatives, other times out of his car. And the murders continued.

On March 27, 1981, Edith Ledet, a 34-year-old medical student, was stabbed to death while jogging in Houston. Six months later, on September 12, 25-year-old Elizabeth Montgomery was attacked while walking her dog at midnight, staggering into her nearby apartment before she collapsed.

Two hours later, 21-year-old Susan Wolfe was knifed to death outside her apartment, nearby, presumed to be a victim of the same assailant. The new year brought no respite from horrors in Houston. In January, 27-year-old Phyllis Tamm was found on the campus of Rice University, hanged with an article of her own clothing, and another Rice student, 25-year-old Margaret Fossi, was killed that same month, found in the trunk of her car, her larynx crushed by a powerful blow that produced death by asphyxiation.

On February 7, Elena Semander, a 20-year-old co-ed, was found strangled and partially nude in a trash bin, not far from a tavern where she had spent the evening. In March 1982, Emily LaQua was reported missing from Brookshire, Texas, 40 miles north of Houston, but authorities drew no immediate connection with the spate of unsolved murders.

On March 31, 20-year-old Mary Castillo was found, strangled and semi-nude, in a Houston ditch.

Three nights later, 19-year-old Christine McDonald vanished while hitchhiking home from a booze party on the Rice campus. Suzanne Searles, 25, joined the missing list on April 5, her shoes and broken spectacles recovered from her car, in the parking lot of her apartment complex. Carrie Mae Jefferson, age 32, vanished after working the night shift on April 15, and 26-year-old Yolanda Degracia was killed the following night, stabbed six times in her home. High school student Sheri Strait disappeared with her mother's car on May 1, the car -- and her body -- recovered together on May 4.

Two weeks later, Gloria Cavallis, a 32-year-old exotic dancer, was found dead in a trash dumpster, her body wrapped in cast-off curtains. On the morning of May 23, 1982 -- a Sunday -- Watts was caught while fleeing from the Houston apartment where he had assaulted tenants Lori Lister and Melinda Aguilar.

Lister was half-drowned in the bathtub while Aguilar escaped by throwing herself from the balcony, calling for help. Held in lieu of $50,000 bond, Watts was charged with two counts of attempted murder, plus aggravated assault and burglary. (On the morning of Watts's arrest, another victim, 20-year-old Michelle Maday, was found strangled to death in the bathtub of her Houston apartment.)

Psychiatrists declared Watts sane, but noted his pathological hatred of women, whom he regarded as evil incarnate. The feelings dated back to childhood, when a favorite uncle had allegedly been killed by female relatives.

Diagnosed as a paranoid schizophrenic, Watts was said to view the world around him "as pure fantasies which revolve to a large extent around the struggle against the 'evil' he sees everywhere."

On August 9, 1982, with jury selection under way for his trial, Watts struck a controversial bargain with the prosecutor's office. In return for his guilty plea on burglary charges and acceptance of a 60-year sentence -- the equivalent of life imprisonment in Texas -- Watts would clear the books on several unsolved Houston murders while escaping trial for homicide.

With the deal complete, and Watts compelled to serve a minimum of 20 years before consideration for parole, the defendant confessed to ten Houston murders, including the cases of victims Wolfe, Jefferson, Montgomery, Fossi, Semander, Searles, Degracia, Tamm, Ledet and Maday.

He also threw in some surprises, including the non-fatal slashing of a Galveston 19-year-old, attacked on January 30, 1982, and the "accidental" death of 22-year-old Linda Tilley, found floating in an Austin, Texas, swimming pool on September 5, 1981. Other nonfatal assaults were also cleared in Austin, Galveston, and Seabrook, Texas.

Watts led authorities to the remains of victims Searles and Jefferson in Houston, directing other searchers to the body of Emily LaQua, near Brookshire, and he was still talking when Michigan weighed in with charges in the murder of Jeanne Clyne.

Swapping testimony for immunity, Watts ran his score up to thirteen confessed murders with the Clyne case, but detectives suggest that his actual body-count includes a minimum of 22 victims.

On September 3, 1982, Watts received his 60-year sentence, the judge declaring, "I hope they put you so deep in the penitentiary that they'll have to pipe sunlight to you."

November
12, 2002
- Serial killer Coral Eugene Watts was again been denied parole. Watts,
who admitted to 13 murders, is due to be released from prison in 3 1/2
years. Because of a quirk in Texas law, Watts is scheduled for mandatory
release in May 2006. He could be discharged even before that -- after
his next parole hearing in December 2005 -- if he continues to show good
behavior, said Texas Department of Criminal Justice spokesman Larry
Todd.

New charge could keep serial killer
in prison

By Evan Moore - The
Houston Chronicle

The Michigan Attorney General's office Thursday filed a murder charge
against Texas prisoner Coral Eugene Watts, a move that could halt the
release of the serial killer in two years.

Attorney General Mike Cox said he filed the first-degree murder charge
against Watts in the December 1979 stabbing death of a woman in Ferndale,
a Detroit suburb.

If convicted, Watts would spend the rest of his life in prison.
Otherwise he will be released in May 2006, becoming the nation's only
known serial killer to be released from prison.

"This man is a confessed killing machine who has promised to kill again,"
Cox said at a news conference.

Harris County Assistant District Attorney Ira Jones, who prosecuted
Watts, said he thinks the Michigan charge "is wonderful."

"We offered them any assistance we could give," said Jones. "I've been
working with the Michigan people all week and we're very impressed with
their ability."

The action came 1 1/2 years after Houston Chronicle stories revealed
that Watts, who confessed in 1982 to killing 13 women in Texas, would
soon be released.

Watts, 50, a former Michigan resident, was sent to prison on an
aggravated burglary charge as part of a plea bargain in which he
provided information and confessed to the 13 killings in return for
immunity from prosecution.

In addition to the confessed slayings, Watts is suspected of killing
more than 80 others in Texas, Michigan and Canada.

He was expected to serve 60 years, but a glitch in his sentencing left
him eligible for "good time," giving him credit for three days for every
day served and reducing his sentence to roughly a third of its original
length.

When that was brought out by the Chronicle stories in June 2002,
interest grew in Michigan, where Watts was suspected of multiple
killings. A state police task force was formed and began poring through
old cases in an attempt to find one that might be brought against Watts.

The case filed Thursday, however, was not one considered by the task
force. Instead, it involved the 1979 killing of Helen Dutcher, 36, which
came to light when a witness saw Watts' picture on television.

Dutcher was found stabbed to death in an alley behind a Ferndale dry
cleaners.

"There was a witness," said Ferndale homicide Detective George Hartley.
"This guy saw Dutcher and a man struggling in front of the cleaners and
saw the man drag her around the building. Then, he saw the guy drive
away."

The witness contacted police and helped them form a composite drawing, a
drawing Hartley said closely resembles Watts.

Later, when Watts was arrested in Houston, the man saw Watts' picture on
television and again contacted Ferndale police, saying that was the man
he had seen attack Dutcher.

The witness also called Houston police, said Hartley, but was told that
Watts had already agreed to plead to the burglary charge and would never
be released from prison.

The Ferndale detective originally assigned to the case died some years
ago, Hartley said, and other police either assumed Watts was in prison
for life or had never heard of him.

After the Chronicle stories about Watts' impending release appeared in
2002, other media outlets carried the account, including MSNBC, which
aired a story with Cox in January.

Hartley said the witness again called police to tell them Watts was the
man he had seen.

"I've got a warrant here for Watts' arrest right now," Hartley said.

Dutcher, a Detroit resident, had been working as a waitress but was not
employed at the time of her death.

Police said she had been in a restaurant near the cleaners minutes
before she was killed. She was also seen talking to several men on the
sidewalk. The last man was the one identified as Watts.

Dutcher was found dead the next morning with multiple stab wounds.

"This man is a confessed killing machine who has promised to kill again,"
Cox said at a news conference announcing the charge.

In 1989, Michigan law enforcement officials said Watts was a suspect in
the slayings of at least 18 women in the Detroit area.

Kalamazoo police said in January that they planned to seek charges tying
Watts to the 1974 stabbing of Western Michigan University student Gloria
Steele, 19.

Watts, who also was a student at the university that year, was arrested
in the Steele killing and in the assault of another woman, but the
charges were dropped for lack of evidence.

In the 1980s, he became a suspect in the killing of three Ann Arbor
women.

Watts left Michigan after police began round-the-clock surveillance of
him. He moved to Houston, and Ann Arbor police sent a bulletin,
detailing their suspicions and Watts' vital information, to Houston
police.

Watts was never closely watched, however, and managed to kill 13 women
in the next 11 months. He had attacked his 14th Texas victim and was
attempting to drown her in a bathtub when he was apprehended.

Police and Harris County prosecutors, faced with no physical evidence in
any other crimes, reached the plea agreement with Watts and he received
his 60-year sentence after pleading guilty to burglary with intent to
commit murder.

Watts appealed that conviction, contending he had never been informed
that prosecutors were construing the bathtub and water to be a lethal
weapon (a necessity for the charge) and won, making himself eligible for
"good time" and eventual release.

He attempted to escape shortly after reaching prison but was caught and
given additional time. Without that time, he would already be released
because of good behavior credits.

Included in Watts' confessions were nine women in Houston, three in
Galveston and one in Austin. He directed police to the grave sites of
two missing women, and his attorney, after consulting Watts, showed
police a culvert where they discovered the body of Emily Laqua, a
missing 14-year-old girl.

Laqua was found in Waller County, just over the Harris County line and
was mistakenly considered one of the Harris County cases. As a result,
Waller County never granted Watts immunity, and the case might be sought
against him if evidence other than his attorney's statements to police
could be found.

Evidence in the Laqua case was lost, however, and Waller County District
Attorney Oliver Kitzman said he would await the results of the MIchigan
case before seeking any charge.

Cases tied to Coral Eugene Watts

Associated Press

Coral Eugene Watts has confessed to
killing 13 people. Here is a summary of some of the cases:

Oct. 31, 1979: Jeanne Clyne, 35, was stabbed to death on a sidewalk in
the exclusive Detroit suburb of Grosse Point Farms as she walked home
from a doctor's appointment. Police said Watts stabbed Clyne at least 10
times with a woodworking tool similar to a screwdriver.

Sept. 5, 1981: Linda Tilley, 22, was drowned in the swimming pool at her
Austin apartment complex. Houston police Sgt. Tom Ladd said Watts had
trailed another girl for several hours from Houston but lost track of
her in Austin and then spotted Tilley. Ladd said Tilley's death had been
ruled accidental until Watts confessed.

Sept. 12, 1981: Elizabeth Montgomery, 25, was stabbed once outside her
Houston apartment while she walked her dog. Police said Montgomery
apparently made it home before dying. Less than two miles away, Susan
Wolf, 21, was stabbed in the arm and chest outside her Houston apartment
as she carried groceries from her car. Her body was found outside her
apartment.

Jan. 4, 1982: Phyllis Tamm, 27, was found hanging from a small tree near
Houston's Rice University. Tamm's death was not ruled a homicide until
Watts' confession. The medical examiner could not tell if her death was
a freak accident.

Jan. 17, 1982: Architecture student Margaret Fossi, 25, was found dead
in the trunk of her car, which was parked at Rice University. She had
been reported missing a day earlier. Fossi died by asphyxia caused by a
blow to the throat. Watts told police that he later spotted Julia
Sanchez on a freeway as she tried to fix a flat tire. Watts slashed
Sanchez's throat and left her for dead, but she survived.

Jan. 30, 1982: Watts unsuccessfully tried to kill Galveston resident
Patty Johnson by slashing her throat. Another man had been sentenced to
life in prison for the attack until Watts took responsibility.

Feb. 7, 1982: Elena Semander, 20, was found dead in a Houston trash bin.
Watts said he strangled her with her shirt, then threw away her body.

March 20, 1982: Emily LaQua, 14, was strangled on her way to her new job
as a waitress in Brookshire. She had just moved from Seattle to live
with her father in Texas and at first was thought to have run away. Her
body was found five months later stuffed in a culvert. This is the only
case for which Watts did not receive immunity.

March 27, 1982: Edith Ledet, 34, was stabbed to death in Galveston as
she returned home from a graduation party. Her body was found in a
walkway near some apartments. Ledet was to have graduated later that day
from the University of Texas Medical Branch, where she had earned her
degree after giving up an accounting career. Later that morning, Watts
attacked Glenda Kirby, who lived several blocks away. Kirby escaped
Watts' grip because his hands were bloody from killing Ledet, prosecutor
Ira Jones said.

April 15, 1982: Yolanda Gracia, 21, was stabbed to death in her front
lawn as she returned home. She was found clutching a bag that contained
her work shoes.

April 16, 1982: Carrie Jefferson, 32, was strangled and then stabbed
twice as she returned home from her job at Houston's downtown post
office. Watts buried Jefferson's body along White Oak Bayou.

April 21, 1982: Suzanne Searles, 25, was grabbed as she returned home
from a party. Watts told police that while he was strangling her, he
couldn't tell if she was dead so he held her head in a flowerpot full of
water. Watts buried Searles, who had moved to Houston from Des Moines,
Iowa. Her grave was the first to which he led police following his
confession in 1982.

May 23, 1982: Michelle Maday, 20, was returning home about 4 a.m. when
Watts choked her to death outside her apartment. Watts told police he
took Maday's body into the apartment and dumped it in the bathtub. Watts
was arrested later as he attempted to kill Lori Lister and her roommate,
Melinda Aguilar.

Inmate charged in '79
slaying

First murder count for confessed
killer

March 5, 2004

By Frank Witsil and Jim Schaefer -
Free Press

For the first time in his life, 22
years after police said he admitted killing more than a dozen women in
Michigan and other states, Coral E. Watts has been charged with murder.

The charge was filed Thursday in Ferndale District Court.

But, police said, the witness who connected the confessed serial killer
to the 1979 slaying of Helen Dutcher in Ferndale had come forward before
-- twice.

The first time was just after the killing. The second in 1982, when
Watts confessed to several murders and was given immunity from
prosecution for those deaths.

This time, the witness account might lead to a murder conviction.

Michigan Attorney General Mike Cox announced the first-degree murder
charge at a news conference in Detroit, about seven miles south of where
Watts allegedly attacked Dutcher behind a dry cleaners at Woodward and 8
Mile.

"This man is a confessed killing machine who has promised to kill again,"
Cox said. "The specter of Watts' release has haunted Michigan families,
the nation and untold victims and their families for too long."

Watts, 50, allegedly stabbed Dutcher, 36, of Ferndale a dozen times in
her neck and back. Dutcher was not among those Watts had confessed to
killing, which allowed authorities to bring the new charge.

Watts grew up in Inkster and moved to Texas in 1981. He currently is
serving a 60-year-sentence in Huntsville, Texas, after pleading guilty
to burglary with intent to commit murder.

But Texas law allowed Watts, who was 28 when convicted, to obtain good-behavior
credits and other sentence reductions that have cut decades from his
sentence.

He is set to be released in May 2006.

His impending release has angered and frightened victim rights groups
and relatives and friends of his victims. Michigan authorities have been
scrambling to review old cases to win a new conviction and keep him
behind bars.

Cox said he wants to extradite Watts to Michigan in a few weeks to face
the charge in Ferndale and an eventual trial in Oakland County Circuit
Court. In Michigan, first-degree murder carries a mandatory life
sentence without parole upon conviction.

Authorities said that Watts eventually confessed to killing 22 people in
Texas, Michigan and Windsor. Some investigators said they believe he
killed even more.

Cunning and calculating

Saline Police Chief Paul Bunten, an investigator with the Ann Arbor
Police Department in the early 1980s who interviewed Watts several
times, said Watts is suspected of killing three women in Ann Arbor.

He described Watts as cunning and streetwise.

"My worst fear is that he would hit the streets again," Bunten said. "He
was very calculating. He knows what information can be used against him
and what can't."

Watts was arrested in 1982 in Houston after he broke into the home of
two women, tied up one and tried but failed to drown the other in a
bathtub.

Bunten said Watts freely admitted to murdering women -- but not the ones
for whom he was being investigated. Once, Bunten recalled, he
interviewed Watts in Texas in the early 1980s with three other
investigators.

Bunten said: "I don't have enough fingers and toes to count how many
people you killed." Bunten quoted Watts as saying: "There are not enough
fingers and toes in this room."

Michigan authorities suspect Watts also is responsible for the 1974
stabbing death of a 19-year-old Western Michigan University student in
Kalamazoo.

Ferndale Police Detective George Hartley, who has been investigating the
case along with the Attorney General's Office and State Police, said the
witness is key to the case.

They declined to release his name.

Hartley said the witness, a 45-year-old Westland man, was watching MSNBC
earlier this year and saw old film footage of Watts. He contacted the
state Attorney General's Office, Hartley said.

The image reminded the witness of what he saw on Dec. 1, 1979.

"It was cold, with snow on the ground," said Hartley, a 35-year veteran
of the police force. "The witness was close enough to see, but not close
enough to hear anything."

Through a bedroom window, Hartley said, the witness saw Watts and
Dutcher, who police said was stabbed to death, struggle, and then the
witness saw Dutcher fall to the ground.

The witness told his wife to call police, and the next day described the
suspect to a sketch artist. At the time, Hartley said, investigators
could not identify the face.

The witness came forward again in 1982 after seeing Watts on television.

Hartley said: "He tells his wife: 'That's the guy who killed this woman
in the alley.' " And again, the witness approached authorities, Hartley
said. But the witness was never called to testify.

"The expense and dollars probably factored into it," Hartley said.

Plea deal

Prosecutors made a deal to convict Watts on a lesser charge, and he
confessed in graphic detail to several murders, including that of Jeanne
Clyne, a former Detroit News food writer, in Grosse Pointe Farms in
1979.

At the time, authorities said, it was thought that Watts would spend 60
years in prison -- effectively a life sentence.

Michael Clyne, Jeanne's former husband who has since remarried, said he
was pleased to hear that Watts was charged. Authorities granted Watts
immunity from prosecution in exchange for the confession so he would not
be charged with Jeanne Clyne's slaying.

At the time, Michael Clyne said, authorities had no evidence linking
Watts to the crime. Jeanne was found stabbed on the sidewalk a few
blocks away from her Grosse Pointe Farms home.

"I hope and pray they have enough of a case to convict him," Michael
Clyne said. "The man is very sick. I don't know what justice means in
this case. I am just concerned he is not released."

Serial killer could face Michigan
charges by month's end

By Pam Easton / Associated Press

HOUSTON -- A confessed serial killer
who is scheduled to be released from the Texas prison system in two
years could be on his way to Michigan to face a murder charge in the
coming weeks.

“The governor’s general counsel wants to review the paperwork carefully
and make sure everything is in order,” Perry spokeswoman Kathy Walt said.
“The governor will sign it as soon as possible.”

Once the extradition request is signed, Watts, who received immunity for
the killings of 13 women as part of a plea agreement on a burglary with
intent to commit murder charge in 1982, will receive the warrant at the
Texas Department of Criminal Justice’s Ellis Unit, where he is housed.

“Once he is served with the warrant ... he can fight extradition,” Walt
said.

Watts was sentenced to 60 years in prison as part of the 1982 plea
agreement. He told Houston police after his capture that he targeted
women who had evil eyes. But the evidence against Watts was scant
because of his quick work killing randomly selected women who he stabbed,
hanged, strangled or drowned, according to Houston police.

Harris County prosecutors, police and the judge thought Watts would be
behind bars until he was an octogenarian. But mandatory release laws
require his discharge on April 9, 2006. He will be 52.

If released, Watts would become the first serial killer in U.S. history
freed from prison, according to Michigan authorities. They say Watts is
suspected of 26 murders, including six in Michigan and two in Windsor,
Canada, and has claimed up to 100 victims.

Michigan authorities charged Watts with murder two months ago for the
1979 killing of Helen Dutcher in Ferndale, a Detroit suburb. If the
extradition request, based on the murder charge, is approved and goes
unchallenged, Michigan authorities will come to Texas to retrieve Watts,
Walt said.

An eyewitness, who resurfaced more than two decades after the killing,
prompted the charge, Michigan Attorney General Mike Cox has said.

“The sooner Watts is brought to Michigan, the sooner my office will be
able to begin judicial proceeding,” he said.

It was unclear Friday if Watts, who moved from Michigan to Houston in
1981, would fight the extradition request.

He previously has declined an interview with The Associated Press and
since has requested prison officials not approach him with media
requests, prison spokeswoman Michelle Lyons said Friday.

Zinetta Burney, who represented Watts in 1982, said she no longer is his
attorney. The Texas prison system, the governor’s office and the Harris
County District Attorney’s office also have no record of an attorney for
Watts.

“To our knowledge, he has no attorney,” prosecutor Ira Jones said.

Watts has been visited in prison by authorities from Michigan and Texas
but so far, “has cooperated with no one,” Jones said.

Authorities in Harris and Waller counties, as well as a number of
jurisdictions in Michigan, continue investigations into Watts. All the
agencies involved in ongoing investigations are sharing information and
working together, Jones said.

“There has been a decision to basically allow Michigan to proceed with
what they have,” he said.

Houston victims’ advocate Andy Kahan, who has been working with victims’
families to keep Watts behind bars, met with a number of the families in
Houston on Friday to discuss traveling to Michigan for Watts’ first
court appearance.

“It looks like they are going to be able to keep him from harming any
other women for the rest of his life -- assuming there is a conviction,”
Kahan said. “Hopefully there is enough there, and that will be the end
of the game.”

DETROIT -- An attorney for an admitted
serial killer said Monday he will fight to exclude evidence about his
client’s past crimes from his trial for a 1979 slaying.

Coral Eugene Watts, 50, confessed in 1982 to killing 12 women in Texas
and one in Michigan. But thanks to a controversial plea bargain and an
early-release program, Watts is due to leave prison in two years.
Michigan authorities are trying to prevent Watts’ release by trying him
for the slaying of Helen Dutcher in Ferndale 25 years ago.

Prosecutors have filed notice that they intend to introduce evidence
about the other killings Watts confessed to. Judges can admit such
“prior bad acts” if they point to a common scheme or system that ties
the person to the crime in question.

“In this case, Watts always targeted young single women of smaller
stature, he stalked them, he would get them when they’re alone, and
would have no sexual assault involved,” said Randall Thompson, a
spokesman for the Michigan Attorney General’s office, which is
prosecuting the case.

Watts’ lawyer, Ronald Kaplovitz, said he would file a motion Tuesday in
Oakland County Circuit Court to exclude the evidence.

“My biggest concern is that it’s going to interfere with the ability of
the jurors to focus their attention on what’s really important in this
case, which is what happened on December 1, 1979,” Kaplovitz said. “What
happened in Texas was dealt with by the Texas courts.”

Kaplovitz said any value such evidence has for showing a pattern must be
balanced against Watts’ right to a fair trial.

“I’m hopeful that the judge will exclude it or at least limit it to some
extent,” he said.

Watts was suspected in a string of killings when he was arrested in 1982
after breaking into a Houston apartment and trying to drown a woman.
Lacking evidence, authorities in Texas and Michigan allowed Watts to
plead guilty to burglary with intent to murder in exchange for
confessions to 13 murders in Texas and one in Michigan.

Watts was sentenced to 60 years in prison, but is due for release in
2006 because of good-behavior credits. If convicted of first-degree
murder in Dutcher’s death, Watts faces a mandatory life sentence without
the possibility of parole.

A hearing in the case is scheduled for Tuesday. The trial is to begin on
Nov. 8.

Two homicides have stayed on
the mind of former WMU police chief for years

Sunday, August 8, 2004

In the 21 years since John Cease left
the Western Michigan University Public Safety Department, he has never
forgotten two female students who were murdered during his time there.

And, at certain moments during his 30-year career in law enforcement, it
often weighed on his mind that -- up until this year -- the men thought
responsible were never punished.

There was Gloria Steele, a 19-year-old student found dead Oct. 30, 1974,
in the Stadium Drive apartment she shared with her 3-year-old daughter.
She was stabbed in the chest 33 times.

And six years later, Patricia Lang.

Lang, 21, a junior at WMU, was found slain in her car in WMU Parking Lot
23 on Oct. 17, 1980. An autopsy concluded she had been shot in the left
temple at close range with a small-caliber handgun.

But these days, Cease, 56, a former captain and chief with WMU, can
sleep a bit easier.

Roberto D'Avanzo, 47, a former boyfriend of Lang, was found guilty in
May of hiring a hit man to carry out the killing and was sentenced to
life in prison. His conviction came after the case was reopened in 2002
by the Kalamazoo Cold Case Team.

In the Steele case, the man long thought
responsible for her murder, Coral Eugene Watts, is being held in a
Ferndale jail awaiting trial for the 1979 stabbing death of a Detroit
woman. If convicted he faces life in prison.

And, nearly 30 years after Steele was killed, Watts also may face
charges in her killing.

In March, the cold case team presented to Kalamazoo County Prosecutor
James Gregart the results of its one-year investigation into the Steele
slaying.

Gregart said this week that officials from his office were continuing to
review the case and "explore our options." He said he has meetings
planned in "the near future" with individuals involved in the
investigation.

He declined to say when a decision on charges against Watts could be
announced.

Cease, who retired in 2003 as police chief of the Wilmington, N.C.,
Police Department, said the sheer gruesomeness of Steele's killing has
always been a vivid memory.

And the frustration he felt over not being able to pin the murders of
Steele and Lang on Watts and D'Avanzo is with him even today.

A lack of evidence prevented authorities from getting Watts in 1974. And
charges against D'Avanzo were dismissed in 1983 after a confession was
found inadmissible by the Michigan Court of Appeals.

"It's not like it's on your mind every day and it sits there every day
and eats at you, but it's always in the back of your mind," Cease said.
"(The Steele murder) is the most violent one I've ever seen. She was
stabbed over and over and over again."

During his career, Cease said he was involved in close to 150 homicide
investigations.

While memories of the Steele and Lang killings faded with time, Cease
said he was often reminded of the homicides by their similarities to
murder investigations that came his way over the years.

"I've seen other things that are horrible," Cease said. "I've seen
children killed in homicides. You try not to dwell on that. You've gotta
kind of be a special person to be a cop to begin with.

"It is truly the greatest show on earth, but it's not for everybody," he
said.

Cease said when authorities are able to close the book on an unsolved
murder, no matter how many years have passed, it is pleasing. The recent
conviction of D'Avanzo and the possibility of charges against Watts were
no different for him, he said.

"When you can remove a couple of those, I feel better," Cease said. "And
that's nice. That cold case team gave me something I couldn't have
gotten any other way."

Judge to decide on details of
trial for Coral Watts

Monday, September 27, 2004

Associated Press

PONTIAC, Mich. -- A Michigan judge is
expected to decide within two weeks whether a jury can hear about the
1982 confession of serial killer Coral Watts.

Watts is scheduled to stand trial in November in the stabbing death of
Helen Dutcher in Ferndale, Michigan, 25 years ago.

Watts confessed to killing 13 women in Texas and Michigan, but was given
immunity for those crimes. Instead, he pleaded guilty to a Harris County
burglary charge that was supposed to put him behind bars for 60 years.

But Watts is now expected to be freed from a Texas prison as soon as
2006 for good behavior.

Oakland County, Michigan, prosecutors are trying to keep him in prison
by convicting him in Dutcher's death.

Watts' lawyer says jurors would be prejudiced if they are told about his
previous confession. But prosecutors say the other killings help
establish a pattern of behavior.

Jury to hear of killer's record

Ferndale case could keep him locked up

October 9, 2004

By L.L. Brasier - Free Press

In a devastating blow to the defense, an Oakland County judge ruled
Friday that jurors will get to hear about the dozen women Coral Watts
confessed to killing in Michigan and Texas two decades ago, testimony
prosecutors hope will help convict him of the 1979 killing of a Ferndale
woman.

Watts, 50, is to stand trial Nov. 8 in Oakland County Circuit Court,
charged with stabbing Helen Dutcher to death.

Watts, raised in Inkster, has caught national attention as an example of
the failures of the criminal justice system. Because of a technicality,
he is eligible for parole in 2006, even though he has told investigators
he killed as many as 100 women by strangling, hanging, drowning and
stabbing them to death.

If released, he would be the first known serial killer to be set free.

Watts has been in prison since 1982 after he tried to kill two women in
their Houston area apartment. Under a deal reached with Texas
authorities, he pleaded guilty to aggravated burglary in exchange for
confessing to the murders, with a promise of immunity, and was sentenced
to 60 years in prison.

In 1989, though, the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals reduced his
conviction on a technicality, making him eligible for parole in 2006.

This year, he was charged in Michigan with killing Dutcher after a
person came forward and told authorities he saw Watts slash the 36-year-old
woman early on Dec. 1, 1979.

Last month, prosecutors from the Michigan Attorney General's Office
argued before Oakland County Circuit Judge Richard Kuhn that Watts'
confessions to the other killings should be admitted at his Michigan
trial because they showed a pattern of behavior.

His defense attorney, Ronald Kaplovitz, protested, saying such
information would inflame the jurors and keep them from focusing on the
case at hand.

Kuhn, in a written statement released Friday, agreed with prosecutors,
although he will limit what prosecutors can say about the immunity
agreement Watts obtained in Texas.

Kaplovitz said he was disappointed but not surprised by the ruling.

"Obviously, we are concerned that the information will sway jurors,"
Kaplovitz said.

"We are hopeful we can get fair-minded jurors who can look at the
evidence they have in this case."

Prosecutors did not return calls seeking comment.

Serial killer case to air on '60
Minutes'

Friday, October 15, 2004

Confessed serial killer Coral
Watts and the retired Ann Arbor detective who tracked him for years will
be featured on the CBS television program "60 Minutes" Sunday, just
three weeks before Watts is set to go on trial for a 1979 Ferndale
slaying.

Watts, 50, is suspected of killing as
many as 100 women in the late 1970s and early 1980s, including three Ann
Arbor women during a six-month span in 1980. But Watts has never been
convicted of murder, and he struck a controversial plea deal in Texas
that could allow him to go free in May 2006.

Saline Police Chief Paul Bunten, who investigated the Ann Arbor
homicides Watts is suspected of committing, will be included in the
broadcast and has been active in the nationwide efforts to keep Watts
imprisoned. He remains convinced Watts is responsible for the local
deaths, but lacked the physical evidence or eyewitness testimony needed
to prosecute him.

Watts moved to Texas and was caught fleeing an apartment where
authorities say he was attempting to kill two women inside in 1982, but
Watts was allowed to plead guilty to burglary with intent to commit
murder in exchange for confessions in 12 slayings in Texas. He received
immunity for those confessions and led police to several graves.

Watts was sentenced to 60 years in prison, but his sentence was reduced
significantly because of good time credits in the Texas system. A
nationwide effort to keep him locked up gained publicity three years
ago, and an eyewitness said he watched Watts kill a Ferndale woman near
a dry cleaning business in 1979. He was charged in that case and goes on
trial Nov. 8 in Oakland County.

The "60 Minutes" broadcast airs at 7 p.m.

Coral Eugene Watts
(born November 7, 1953) is an American serial killer. He managed to
obtain immunity for a dozen murders as a result of a plea bargain with
prosecutors in 1982; it appeared that he could be released in 2006
despite possibly having committed as many as 80 murders.

History

On May 23, 1982, Watts was arrested
for breaking into the home of two young women in Houston, Texas, and
attempting to kill them. While in custody, police began to link Watts
with the recent murders of a number of women.

Until early 1981 he had lived in
Michigan, where authorities suspected him of being responsible for the
murders of at least ten women and girls.

Watts was previously questioned for
murder in 1975, but there had not been enough evidence to convict him;
although he had spent a year in prison for attacking a woman, who
survived.

Prosecutors in Texas did not feel they
had enough evidence to convict Watts of murder, so in 1982 they arranged
a plea bargain. If Watts gave full details and confessions to his
crimes, they would give him immunity from the murder charges and he
would, instead, face just a charge of burglary with intent to murder.

This charge carried a sixty-year
sentence, which the authorities felt would be enough to keep 29-year-old
Watts off the streets for good. He agreed with the deal and promptly
confessed in detail to twelve murders both in Michigan and Texas.

A New
Discovery

Watts later claimed that he had killed
forty women, and then implied the total was as many as eighty; A lot of
the killings were not linked to each other. Serial killers normally
select victims within a certain age group, and usually kill by the same
method.

Watts, on the other hand, killed
females aged from 14 to 44, and they were killed in a variety of ways;
stabbing, slashing, strangulation and bludgeoning. Also, serial killers
usually kill people of their own race; Watts, who was African American,
selected victims both of his own race and of others.

Watts was sentenced to the agreed 60
years, but the prosecutors did not take into account the rules for early
release. Watts was a model prisoner, and under Texan Law he could have
up to two days deducted from his sentence for each one day served, as
long as he was well behaved. This meant that Watts could be released as
early April 2006.

A New
Conviction

In 2004, authorities made appeals to
possible witnesses in order to try and convict Watts of murder to ensure
he was not released, given that he had made it clear he would kill again
if he ever got out of prison. A man came forward to say that he had seen
a man fitting Watts' description fleeing the scene of the murder of
Helen Dutcher, a 36-year-old woman who died after being stabbed twelve
times in December 1979. Watts had immunity from prosecution for the
twelve killings he had admitted to, but that did not apply to other
murders such as that of Dutcher, which Watts had not specifically
confessed to.

Watts was promptly charged with the
murder of Helen Dutcher and, on November 17, 2004, a Michigan jury
convicted him. On December 7, he was sentenced to life imprisonment,
virtually ensuring that the 51-year-old Watts would never get out of
prison.

Two
days later, authorities in Michigan started making moves to try him for
the murder of Western Michigan University student Gloria Steele who was
stabbed to death.